ANGER is growing over a bizarre advert in Canada in which the Westminster government promotes whisky without mentioning Scotland.

Instead the advert, spotted on a billboard outside the British High Commission in Ottawa, uses a picture of The Quiet Man whiskey which is blended and bottled in Derry in Northern Ireland.

The advert is part of the "Great" campaign to promote British food and drink which is run by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

It features The Quiet Man whiskey alongside the declaration “Heritage is Great”

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According to the advert: “The UK is home to 315 distilleries and produces some of the world’s most sought-after spirits, including world-famous whiskies refined over hundreds of years.”

Yet somehow the heritage of Scotch is not mentioned and the whiskey pictured was only launched in 2016.

SNP politicians have reacted to the growing storm on social media over the advert.

Douglas Chapman tweeted: “In Ottawa Scottish taxpayers money promotes 'British' whiskey. I’ve made the point directly to Liam Fox (time and time again) that if you promote Scotland the Brand everyone wins.

"They think by undermining Scotland it saves their 'precious' Union."

Scotland’s Brexit minister Michael Russell MSP tweeted: “Utterly extraordinary for a major @GovUK marketing push promoting whisky to fail to mention #Scotland once.”

The advert is not even factually correct. It states that the UK is home to 315 distilleries, but that was the figure for 2017 and in Scotland alone there were 10more distilleries that opened in 2018 – the huge growth in gin distilling is responsible for most of the expansion.

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Twitter users have complained about the advert. Robert Buntin tweeted: “The BritNat UKG is determined to wipe out Scotland the brand and Scotland the European nation. We must leave the UK to escape this fate.”

Brian Macpherson added: “If they quoted Scotland, then Scotland becomes independent, they would lose the illusion of all being 'Britain's Whisky/Whiskey'. The ad is disingenuous in the number of whiskies quoted (muddying waters), but why an Irish Whiskey as opposed to a Scottish Whisky in the picture?”